Thank you very much for your help.
The weapon is specifically called an "ono" (axe) in Japanese, and it's specifically a non-Japanese weapon.
The author states it "may come from somewhere around Nepal"... a statement people on this board don't support.
Anyway, it was the author's purpose to make it a weird weapon fit to a weird user. That guy's the leader of a rogue "fighting school/style" strongly contending against the formalism of (peace-time) Tokugawa Japan martial arts, on the ground that "exploiting any effective mean to win is the only true martial art".
Somewhere else in the series, he says something on the lines of:
"This cumbersome axe is not as sharp as a Japanese sword, I agree. However, you don't need to use strength to block it [meaning, I think, that he just lets it fall, then controls it by dexterity alone]. That's a crucial advantage to me, with my skinny arms and slight build."
Pure fancy?
R.
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